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Kevin Ozee om slalom:utrustning tendenser mm
Passade på att fråga Kevin om tillverkare gör koordinerade anstr., för att få fram slalom. Frågade även vad han trodde om ett mtrl.begr. regelement och hur det skulle funka:
Hi Kevin. with all respect to Your secrecy agreements I wonder if You can tell us if the Hypersonic points higher upwind than other boards (especially the prototype You are mentioning). To many users in countries like Sweden were i live and surf it is very interesting with the upwind performance, especially if You surf in a lake like I did for 3 Years before moving to the west-coast. Your mentioning of non-liveliness of the HS is a very important point, what´s the point of a short board that behaves like a long?
I also have this question: In the late 80´s I competed in slalom and it was great excitement, except for material costs for me as student. Q1: Are there any co-ordinated discussions between companies and organisations for making the slalom-racing available for people on a limited material ground?We all now that different kinds of racing (wether it is formula 1 or rally) have seen the necessity of applying material/cost-reduction rules, to make it possible for many contenders to “be in game” for pole position.
Q2: As technical dir. I realise that it must be a real challenge to make sails that cover as large windows as special, they must be made widely tuneable yet stable and performing max all over the window to fit the goal of Q1= impossible to make, but a really great challenge for the R&D department. How do You look upon this if it was Your task to make fex 3slalom sails covering all the range (now Im actually targeting at 3 sails/season not per competition-registering). Performance would, of course lack, but it would strike equal on contenders and maybe it would bring back slalom to new big days -or?
Thank You for taking time reading. -Mark Jansson
Aloha Mark,
Regarding Q1, I do not know of a coordianted effort to organize slalom for the future, at least not between manufacturers. There does seem to be a coordinated effort in the PWA and FWA. I have caught wind of PWA events for slalom in 2004, and discussion of a Formula Slalom fleet for FWA in 2004. A lot of racers are leading this coordination for a slalom revival. I think manufacturers are more inclined to follow the leader on these issues, and if the PWA and FWA schedule events then manufacturers will start making gear accordingly. That’s what is happening with the new Supercross discipline right now. The manufacturers aren’t always as pro-active or as cooperative as they could be…Regarding Q2, we’re already thinking ahead for a 3 sail Formula slalom quiver for 2004. In fact, it may already exist in the V8’s new sizing. My impression is a slalom quiver of 7.2/9.0/10.6 may be a reasonable target. Sailors are making these kind of jumps already, so with some specialized design a Formula slalom quiver of 3 sails should be easily feasible.
Will a 7.0 to 11.0 range of 3 sails work for every venue? No, of course not. Good luck using that on Maui or Tarifa or Leucate. So, the PWA and FWA will have to address the venue issue before the sizing of a Formula slalom quiver is truly created. A 5.8/6.8/7.8 may be more realistic. Too soon to say…
I do think Formula slalom would be successful. Less equipment and cost intensive than Formula, an easier format of racing for all levels, and great action for spectators. Let’s hope it all comes together…
Best regards, Kevin
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